Chinese Launch Misses
Mark with Satellite Placement (Source: GB Times)
An upper stage malfunction has left a Chinese satellite in a
lower-than-planned orbit after a launch Sunday. The Long March 3B
lifted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center at 12:12 p.m.
Eastern carrying the Chinasat-9A satellite. It was not until early
Monday, though, that Chinese officials announced that the third stage
of the rocket malfunctioned, leaving the satellite in a lower orbit
than planned. Officials did not provide additional details about the
satellite's orbit, but did state that the satellite had deployed its
solar panels and was functioning normally. (6/19)

SpaceX Delays Florida
Launch to Replace Fairing Valve (Source: Florida Today)
SpaceX has postponed the launch of a Bulgarian communications satellite
until Friday, setting up a "doubleheader" with a West Coast launch.
SpaceX said Sunday it was delaying the Falcon 9 launch of
BulgariaSat-1, previously scheduled for Monday, until at least Friday
to replace a valve in the rocket's payload fairing. SpaceX said that,
despite the delay in this launch from Florida, it was still targeting a
Sunday launch of 10 Iridium Next satellites on a Falcon 9 from
Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. (6/18)

XCOR Chief Gets DOD Job
(Space News)
The White House has nominated the president and CEO of XCOR Aerospace
to a top Pentagon position. The administration announced late Friday
that it has nominated Jay Gibson to be Deputy Chief Management Officer
within the Office of the Secretary of Defense, a position responsible
for management of business systems within the Defense Department.
Gibson had been head of XCOR Aerospace, a developer of rocket engines
and the Lynx suborbital spaceplane, since March 2015. During that time,
the company halted work on Lynx to focus on engine work. (6/19)

Few Teachers Believe
Students Interested in Subjects That Would Lead to Space Exploration
Careers (Source: Space Daily)
A strong future Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM)
workforce is vital to sending humans to Mars, yet a new survey
commissioned by Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) shows about a third of U.S.
middle school and high school teachers (36 percent) see enthusiasm from
their students about STEM learning.

To help address these findings, today the company unveiled new
resources as part of its Generation Beyond program, including a
space-themed curriculum and new app that simulates what it's like to
explore the surface of Mars. NASA is planning to send a crew to Mars in
the 2030s. To meet tomorrow's ambitious goals, the country will need
thousands of today's students to follow career paths that will create
the next generations of scientists, engineers and space explorers.
(6/19)

Full-Scale Crew Dragon
Recovery Trainer Being Built at KSC (Source: SpaceFlight
Insider)
The evolution in Dragon design has been shaped by the CRS contract
drawing a line between a cargo version and a crew version. Dragon v1
has been responsible for delivering 10 cargo shipments to the
International Space Station (ISS). Crew Dragon, or Dragon v2, will fly
crews to Low Earth Orbit (LEO) as early as 2018.

At the Kennedy Space Center, engineers are building a full-scale model,
or Recovery Trainer, of the Crew Dragon capsule with the aid of the
Kennedy Prototype Lab, which has a history of providing fast solutions
to complex design challenges. SpaceX is putting the finishing
engineering touches into the Recovery Trainer to ensure that it will
float identically to how an actual Dragon v2 will with a crew present.

The Crew Dragon can carry up to seven astronauts, which makes
evacuation more challenging. Two escape hatches and other various
components within the Recovery Trainer will be present to better
reflect a real-world environment for astronaut crew and Pararescuemen,
also known as PJs. USAF Pararescuemen will be required to enter the
water to assist in any number of rescue scenarios where a crew may or
may not be able to assist in their own recovery. (6/19)

Rocket Scientist Says
Space the Place for Budding Entrepreneurs (Source: Irish
Times)
The man behind one of the world’s first rocket launches from a private
site has called on Irish spacetech firms to focus on small satellites
if they want to get ahead. Peter Beck, chief executive and founder of
Rocket Lab, said money is no longer an obstacle for companies who want
to build their own satellites.

Rocket Lab, whose mission it to remove barriers to commercial space by
providing frequent-launch opportunities, last month successfully
launched a low-cost battery-powered 3-D printed rocket called Electron
into orbit from New Zealand’s remote Mahia Peninsula. The maiden flight
was one of three tests the company is undertaking this year.

At full production Rocket Lab expects to launch more than 50 times a
year, and is regulated to launch up to 120 times per annum. In
comparison, there were 22 launches last year from the US, and 82
internationally. Starting price for flights start at about $5 million,
with already-signed customers including NASA, Spire, Planet, Moon
Express and Spaceflight. (6/15)

Spacecraft to Launch,
Land at Cape Canaveral — and it's Not SpaceX or Blue Origin
(Source: Orlando Business Journal)
An aerospace manufacturer will build a reusable spaceplane the size of
a business jet that will launch from and land at the Cape Canaveral
Spaceport. Boeing won the contract — valued at $146 million — with
DARPA last month to build the spaceplane called the XS-1, or the
Phantom Express. Vertical takeoff of the plane is scheduled for 2020,
and the goal is for it to launch daily, with the ability to carry
satellites to low Earth orbit.

Reusable rockets are becoming a staple for rocket companies to help
lower the cost of launches and to be competitive in a growing
commercial market. However, some experts have said we're still a long
way off from used rocket totally changing the cost of launches. "I’ve
been hearing the argument about reusability and they say it’s the path
to the future, but we’re a long way off. Here's why: If you look at the
economics of it, cost benefits only work if you get up to 50, 60 or 70
units a year, and then it starts to pay for itself,” said Vector's Jim
Cantrell. (6/15)

Craig Technologies Wins
NASA SLS Stage Adapter Role (Source: Craig Technologies)
Craig Technologies is part of the winning team that will be
building the Universal Stage Adapter (USA) for NASA’s Space Launch
System as a subcontractor to Dynetics, Inc. The USA will
connect the Orion spacecraft to SLS and provides additional cargo space
for future launch configurations.

The stage adapter is 32.4 feet tall and 27.6 feet in diameter at its
largest point, and will provide environmental control to payloads
during ground operations, launch and ascent, while also accommodating
the electrical and communication paths between the Exploration Upper
Stage (EUS) and Orion.

The Dynetics Team will design, develop, test, evaluate, produce and
deliver the first universal stage adapter for the second integrated
mission of SLS and Orion, known as Exploration Mission-2, or EM-2. This
mission will be the first test flight with crew aboard NASA’s new deep
space exploration systems. (6/19)

SpaceX's Mars-Colony
Rocket Could Make "Pinpoint Landing" at Launch Pad
(Source: Space.com)
SpaceX has already brought a Falcon 9 booster safely down to Earth 11
times during orbital launches, on each occasion successfully targeting
a relatively small landing zone: either the deck of a robotic ship at
sea or a pad on terra firma near the launch site.

But these touchdowns could get even more precise when SpaceX starts
flying its huge, reusable Mars rockets, which the company is developing
to help establish a million-person city on the Red Planet. "If you have
been watching the Falcon 9 landings, you will see that they are getting
increasingly closer to the bull's-eye," Musk wrote.

"In particular, with the addition of maneuvering thrusters, we think we
can actually put the booster right back on the launch stand," he added.
"Then, those fins at the base are essentially centering features to
take out any minor position mismatch at the launch site." (6/15)

10 New Planets tThat
Could Have Life Discovered (Source: USA Today)
en new Earth-size planets that could host liquid water and might have
rocky surfaces have been found beyond our own modest solar system by
NASA’s Kepler spacecraft, scientists said Monday. The new planets’
existence must still be double-checked. But Kepler’s latest haul —
which includes a planet that is only slightly larger than Earth and
receives the same amount of energy from its sun as Earth — is the
latest triumph for Kepler, which has spotted roughly 80% of the planets
orbiting stars other than our sun. (6/19)

Lockheed Martin Picks
Harris Corp. to Upgrade F-35 Avionics (Source: Harris)
Lockheed Martin has selected Harris Corp. to upgrade mission system
avionics for the F-35 Lightning II as part of the Technology Refresh #3
(TR3) program, significantly boosting the aircraft’s data storage,
display processing and throughput capabilities. Based on Florida's
Space Coast, Harris will provide the Aircraft Memory System (AMS) and
Panoramic Cockpit Display Electronic Unit (PCD EU), which are based on
open architecture and commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) technology. (6/19)

Selecting a New Astronaut
Class (Source: Space Review)
Earlier this month, NASA unveiled a new class of 12 astronauts from a
record-breaking pool of more than 18,000 applicants. Jeff Foust reports
on how NASA carried out that selection process and the future of both
new and current astronauts from the point of view of the agency’s
former chief astronaut. Click here.
(6/19)

Better Than Paris: Space
Solar Power (Source: Space Review)
The decision by the White House to withdraw the United States from the
Paris climate accord has been widely criticized. Peter Garretson
believes, though, that it opens new opportunities for the United States
to invest in alternative technologies, notably space-based solar power,
that can address the climate change issue and more. Click here.
(6/19)

Interstellar
Communication Using Microbial Data Storage: Implications for SETI
(Source: Space Review)
Most have assumed the best way to search for signs of extraterrestrial
intelligence is to look for radio or optical communications. However,
in the first of a two-part paper, Robert Zubrin argues that other
formats may be more effective, with implications both for SETI and
astrobiology in general. Click here.
(6/19)

Sunlight and Shadow:
Putting People on Mars (Source: Space Review)
The decision to send humans to the Moon in the 1960s was in a very
different geopolitical environment from the one that exists today when
planning human missions to Mars. Mack A. Bradley discusses how to make
human Mars exploration relevant when old arguments no longer apply.
Click here.
(6/19)

How a Soviet Lander Could
Help Chinese Astronauts Reach the Moon (Source: Popular
Mechanics)
The Chinese space industry is buying the Soviet propulsion system
designs originally intended to put humans on the Moon, well-informed
sources told Popular Mechanics. As part of this new deal, a Ukrainian
firm will recreate the historic engine module developed to land the
first Soviet cosmonaut on the Moon ahead of the U.S.

The unique engine system designed in the former Ukrainian Soviet
Socialist Republic could be crucial for accelerating China's own
fledgling effort to land a man on the Moon. As the most complex and
challenging part of the lunar lander design, the purchase could save
Chinese engineers years of development work. (6/19)

Orbital Access and
Spaceport Cornwall form Partnership to Provide Horizontal Launch
Services (Source: Rocketeers UK)
Orbital Access Ltd (OAL), a UK based launch systems and aerospace
services business, and Spaceport Cornwall have announced their
partnership in the development of Spaceport Cornwall and to establish
Orbital Access as a principal operator. Spaceport Cornwall comprises
Cornwall Airport Newquay, Goonhilly Earth Station and the wider space
and aerospace supply chain in Cornwall.

The collaboration is also part of a bid for a grant from the UK Space
Agency to establish cost effective end-to-end launch services from an
operational UK spaceport by 2020, as set out in the draft UK
Spaceflight Bill. OAL has also confirmed the impending establishment of
a new office at Goonhilly Earth Station. (6/18)

Alaska Aerospace Company
Wants to Launch More Satellites (Source: AP)
An Alaska aerospace company wants to increase number of launches to at
least two or three launches per year. Representatives from Alaska
Aerospace Corp. spoke about their plans earlier this week at a town
hall meeting in Kodiak. The advancement of small-launch vehicles
provides an opportunity to send more satellites into space, they said.

"Nobody in the small launch vehicle community has been successful yet
to get a small, cheap vehicle operating frequently. But we think the
Rocket Labs and a couple other customers that we're talking to are
going to be successful over the next year, and then these small guys
have a ride they can afford."

There have been 17 launches from the Kodiak launch facility since
November 1998. All were government launches, but the company is
negotiating with three commercial companies to launch from the Pacific
Spaceport Complex-Alaska, King said. (6/18)

Dark Matter Recipe Calls
for One Part Superfluid (Source: Quanta)
The simplest and most popular model holds that dark matter is made of
weakly interacting particles that move about slowly under the force of
gravity. This so-called “cold” dark matter accurately describes
large-scale structures like galaxy clusters. However, it doesn’t do a
great job at predicting the rotation curves of individual galaxies.
Dark matter seems to act differently at this scale.

In the latest effort to resolve this conundrum, two physicists have
proposed that dark matter is capable of changing phases at different
size scales. Justin Khoury, a physicist at the University of
Pennsylvania, and his former postdoc Lasha Berezhiani, who is now at
Princeton University, say that in the cold, dense environment of the
galactic halo, dark matter condenses into a superfluid — an exotic
quantum state of matter that has zero viscosity.

If dark matter forms a superfluid at the galactic scale, it could give
rise to a new force that would account for the observations that don’t
fit the cold dark matter model. Yet at the scale of galaxy clusters,
the special conditions required for a superfluid state to form don’t
exist; here, dark matter behaves like conventional cold dark matter.
(6/17)

What Would a Fidget
Spinner Do in Space? (Source: Mashable)
Would these fidget spinners just spin forever and ever in
weightlessness? The quick answer is: probably not. But to fully answer
this question for the ages, we need to get specific and determine
exactly where these spinners are.

If the fidget spinners were used somewhere built for humans, like the
International Space Station (ISS), then the answer is somewhat easy:
The fidget spinners would work very similarly to those spun on Earth.
"A spinner on ISS would still be subject to friction and air resistance
which would still cause it to stop spinning," NASA spokesman Dan Huot
said via email.

Basically, fidget spinners work thanks to nifty low-friction ball
bearings that allow the outer mechanism to just spin and spin around
its central axis. Even on the Space Station, the (albeit low) friction
and air pressure would still slow the spinner down to eventually stop
it. Now, once you take the spinner outside into the vacuum of space,
things get a little more interesting. (6/17)

Where Do SpaceX and Other
Aerospace Companies Find Engineers? On the Race Track
(Source: LA Times)
As they hire numerous young engineers, NewSpace companies and more
traditional aerospace giants are finding talent in an unlikely place: a
college race-car competition. Next week, 100 university teams will
bring their prototype race cars to the Formula SAE (Society of
Automotive Engineers) competition in Lincoln, Neb., where they will be
judged on design, manufacturing, performance and business logic.

Editor's
Note: Florida Tech now has a partnership with Larsen
Motorsports to build, maintain and drive jet dragsters. This
arrangement was previously with nearby Embry-Riddle (ERAU). ERAU
(located next to the Daytona Speedway) also has an EcoCar automotive
technology program. Florida has also focused on leveraging the region's
computer gaming industry to build its aerospace workforce. (6/16)

Why India Needs a Space
Law (Source: The Hindu)
India as a space superpower stands mightier than ever, but a law that
protects the country’s sovereign, public and commercial interests is
needed. India is today at par with giants such as the United States and
Russia. This fact raises only a natural presumption that India must be
equalizing with these nations at providing sufficient state laws to
regulate this field. Besides, the rate at which India continues to etch
its name in the frontiers of space innovations and technological
know-how only heightens such a presupposition. (6/18)

Price Wars Among The Big
Launchers (Source: Fortune)
SpaceX has not yet launched the Falcon Heavy, its answer to ULA's Delta
Heavy, but it has promised launch prices barely higher than those for
the Falcon 9. The first Falcon Heavy is expected to launch this year.
ULA, under pressure from SpaceX, has continued to push its prices down,
announcing this April that it would dropping the cost of Atlas V
launches by a third, putting it very close to the cost of a SpaceX
Falcon 9 launch.

ULA also said it would eliminate nearly a quarter of its workforce by
the end of this year as part of cost-cutting.But SpaceX isn’t standing
still, either. Its repeated successes since last year in recovering and
reusing rocket components may point to even lower future launch costs,
and SpaceX is working to scale up launch volume. ULA announced its own
reusable rocket initiative in 2015, but Bruno has recently downplayed
the potential impact of reusability on launch costs. (6/18)

Musk Thinks He Can Make
Getting to Mars Cheaper Than Going to College (Source:
Recode)
Sending people to live on Mars may sound outlandish, but SpaceX CEO
Elon Musk is adamant about his plan. And now, we know a little more
about how he sees this all coming together. Space technology journal
New Space published an article by Musk this week outlining his plans,
and Musk tweeted Friday night that changes to the plan are coming.

Here’s what the 16-page paper, available for free online from New Space
until next month, tells us: Going to Mars is still too expensive. The
people who can afford to go to Mars, and the people who actually want
to go, are not the same people at this point. Musk estimates the cost
of getting 12 people to Mars to start a colony is about $10 billion per
person at this point.

“If we can get the cost of moving to Mars to be roughly equivalent to a
median house price in the United States, which is around $200,000, then
I think the probability of establishing a self-sustaining civilization
is very high,” he writes. “I think it would almost certainly occur.”
(6/18)